Communications

My guess is that your answer is less than half or at least “not enough of them.”

Delivering on strategic initiatives on time, every time, is the hallmark of organizations that are best in the world at executing strategy, and they’re rewarded with a premium put on the value of their company.

Organizations that can’t deliver on their strategic initiatives fail at executing their strategy, and organizations that fail at executing strategy will not survive. It is just that simple. Improving how your organization delivers strategic initiatives increases your ability to execute strategy and, therefore, should be one of your organization’s top business imperatives.

That’s a lament that I hear from executives, be they in software development, technology hardware, finance and banking, or automotive. Even people in my field of human development complain about the effort it takes to generate work.

I have to confess that I knew nothing about Michele Ferrero until I read of his passing. Which is not surprising. As The Economist noted in his obituary, this Italian businessman from the Piedmont gave only one interview in his entire life. It was to Italy’s La Stampa and he did so wearing sunglasses, to shield his weak eyes a well as to recede into the background.

Strategy management processes and the so-called “best practices” most organizations follow have not kept pace with the demands of the marketplace and the performance expectations of shareholders. By definition, best practices are “tried and true,” meaning they have been around for a long time—too long.

I have been a Digital Marketer, a Genius, a Business Representative, and a Shift Manager. I have guided through the titles that life has graciously provided me, without a true understanding of what it meant. Now, I find myself in this position again as a Chief Innovation Officer. When people ask me, “Brody, what do you do?” I tell them my respective title. When they look at me with a puzzled ‘yeah right!’ face, I say something to the effect of – “That means I sit in a chair and think about things.” It’s not wrong, that is my job, and for those only seeking your title, that’s all they care about.

That advice comes from a scene in the movie, 13 Days in October, about the Cuban Missile crisis. It was a time in 1962 when the United States and the USSR came about as close as they could to nuclear war.

In the movie recreation Kenny O’Donnell, de-facto chief of staff (played by Kevin Costner), has a conversation with President Kennedy (played by Bruce Greenwood) before Kennedy is to go on television.

ADVANTAGE STRATEGY

Five Paradigm-Shifting Principles

Repeatable processes and procedures add great value in stable and predictable times. Those are not the times we live in today or likely in the future. Strategy that works has got to be based on something that proves successful in unpredictable, fast moving, and changing times. Principles, not process and procedures, provide the overarching guidance in any situation for making the right decisions and taking the best action.

A move toward the Advantage Strategy Paradigm begins with the adoption and commitment to a set of principles that guides all executives in the decisions and actions they take related to developing, planning, and executing strategy. Principles provide a broad context for strategic action and guidelines that can be communicated and taught at all levels of the organization, eventually becoming part of the organization’s culture. Throwing out standard process and procedures in favor of a handful of powerful but easily remembered principles for managing strategy will soon begin to show improvements in your business results.

Like him or not, in my view President Obama is the epitome of a master communicator. Next time you see him on television notice his use of communication strategies including body language, voice inflection, gestures, and the intuitive ability to establish and maintain trust.

Communication is critically important for personal and professional effectiveness. In my experience as an executive coach and counsellor, most relationship issues, especially conflict can almost always be attributed to poor communication.

Albert Einstein said; “We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking that we used when we created them.” In thinking about this statement and in light of the events across the nation regarding the crisis in law enforcement, there are five strategies Leaders in Law can adopt to elevate their agency to the next level. Whether the agency is experiencing challenges or not, these five strategies will provide the thought-leadership to navigate the rough waters in the sea of conflict. Leaders in Law must first understand that the fabric of leadership is the strength that tightly holds the culture together and leadership must remain in a continuous state of forward-motion at every level of the organization. With that, all Leaders in law must be willing to adopt a different approach to achieve improved outcomes and results from their leaders; more specifically, they must…

Today I’m writing about a topic that is rarely talked about in the leadership domain, especially amongst corporate leaders. Now, before you poo-poo the idea, please allow me to explain further.

In my opinion, forgiveness can’t be ignored, because to do so is to defy a natural law like gravity. Forgiveness is one of the primary foundational ways of being for extraordinary leaders such as Nelson Mandela, Jesus and Ghandi.

Making any progress, process transformation or change across American communities and throughout the global business communities as usual is always hard and usually requires a significant investment of resources – people, finance and effort. So, whenever a leader or an organization adopts any new strategy, technology platform, methodology or approach, that adoption has to be driven by both a need and with leadership clarity.